Published by Barrington Stoke An imprint of HarperCollinsPublishers 1 Robroyston Gate, Glasgow, G33 1JN www.barringtonstoke.co.uk HarperCollinsPublishers Macken House, 39/40 Mayor Street Upper, Dublin 1, DO1 C9W8, Ireland First published in 2026 Text © 2026 David Long Illustrations © 2026 Stefano Tambellini Cover design © 2026 HarperCollinsPublishers Limited The moral right of David Long and Stefano Tambellini to be identified as the author and illustrator of this work has been asserted in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act, 1988 ISBN 978-0-00-874600-1 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1 All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in whole or in any part in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise without the prior permission in writing of the publisher and copyright owners Without limiting the exclusive rights of any author, contributor or the publisher of this publication, any unauthorised use of this publication to train generative artificial intelligence (AI) technologies is expressly prohibited. HarperCollins also exercise their rights under Article 4(3) of the Digital Single Market Directive 2019/790 and expressly reserve this publication from the text and data mining exception The contents of this publication are believed correct at the time of printing. Nevertheless the publisher can accept no responsibility for errors or omissions, changes in the detail given or for any expense or loss thereby caused A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library Printed and bound in India by Replika Press Pvt. Ltd.
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For Peter Sillis, who started the ball rolling
CONTENTS 1
FROM PIRATES TO PRINCES Who Were the Normans?
1
2 A KING’S BROKEN PROMISE
9
3 THE ENGLISH ARE REVOLTING!
24
4 THE RICH IN THEIR CASTLES
37
5 THE POOR ON THE LAND
50
6 GOING TO WAR FOR GOD
60
7 BECOMING ENGLISH
72
8 THE ANARCHY
83
9 OUR NORMAN HERITAGE
93
1066: The Battle of Hastings
The Harrying of the North
Winner Takes All
Forbidden to Travel
The Importance of Religion
Turning Invaders into Neighbours
Stephen versus Matilda
How Norman Are You?
1 FROM PIRATES TO PRINCES
Who Were the Normans?
William the Conqueror’s Norman army invaded England in 1066. This army was made up of soldiers descended from Vikings. These Vikings had left Norway, Sweden and Denmark to settle in northern France more than 150 years earlier. Vikings had a terrible reputation as pirates and ferocious warriors. In the ninth and tenth centuries, they raided many coastal communities around Europe. They would arrive by sea to rob, kill or enslave anybody who got in their way.
2
FROM PIRATES TO PRINCES
Fortunately, these violent attacks became less frequent as some of the Vikings switched from raiding to trading goods. They brought honey, fur and walrus ivory to trade for silver and other luxury items they couldn’t find back home. Others used strong wooden ships called longboats to travel thousands of miles across some of the world’s most dangerous oceans. A few of the traders travelled eastwards as far as Siberia. But the most daring explorers sailed west, enduring terrifying Arctic storms to establish new settlements in Iceland, Greenland and even North America. This meant the Vikings managed to cross the Atlantic and land in America hundreds of years before Spain’s Christopher Columbus did when he supposedly “discovered” America in 1492. These epic voyages were very impressive for the longboats – simple wooden vessels that had no cabins or anywhere to shelter from the weather. A thousand years ago, most people
FROM PIRATES TO PRINCES
still couldn’t read or write, so these sailors didn’t even use maps. In total, around 200,000 Vikings are thought to have left Scandinavia to search for a new life abroad, but not all of them were interested in going as far as Iceland or Siberia. Most just wanted some land they could farm, so many settled in England and Ireland, where the warmer weather made it easier to grow crops to eat.
3
4
FROM PIRATES TO PRINCES
Some Vikings decided to go a bit further. They were known as Norsemen, which means “people from the north”, or simply Normans. They sailed across the English Channel to the region of France we now call Normandy. After finding a safe place to land, they built encampments for themselves and, later on, created small villages where families began to farm.
FROM PIRATES TO PRINCES
Vikings had been pagans for hundreds of years, which meant they worshipped many different gods instead of just one like Christians, Jews and Muslims do. However, after arriving in Normandy, they converted to Christianity, following in the footsteps of their leader, Rollo, and his son, Longsword. The local population was already Christian, so the French king insisted that they do this. In return, the king agreed that the newcomers could stay in Normandy as long as the Vikings stopped their raids on his country. The Normans built simple churches of wood or stone. They married French women and adopted the French language as well as French names and many other local customs. These included something called “feudalism”, which was a way of organising communities by making ordinary people work for the king or for their local lord in exchange for protection rather than money.
5
6
FROM PIRATES TO PRINCES
Nearly everyone in Normandy was poor because of this. Most Norman homes were very small compared to the houses we live in today, usually no more than one room. The walls were made of wattle and daub, which is a material made from woven branches covered in dried mud mixed with animal dung. A roof of reeds or thatch kept out most of the rain. One end of the hut was used to shelter the family’s pigs, sheep and cows. A fire in the centre provided heat in winter and was used for cooking. This meant that Norman houses were very smelly, and they were often filled with smoke despite there being a hole in the roof above the fire. People sat around the fire on stools rather than chairs, and the family’s bedding was rolled up during the day to make space. The Normans became well established in this part of France, and the leaders who came after Rollo and Longsword began using titles
FROM PIRATES TO PRINCES
to describe themselves, such as count, duke and even prince. These powerful men started to look and sound like Frenchmen, but they still had some of their old Viking habits. Above all, they wanted to make themselves richer by taking land from other people. At the end of the tenth century, Norman soldiers began conquering Sicily and southern Italy. Later, a Norman called William, Duke of Normandy started to look across the sea towards the rich farmland of the British Isles.
7
8
FROM PIRATES TO PRINCES
Even as a young man, William wanted to be the king of England. He believed this would happen when the old king eventually died. Edward the Confessor was William’s cousin and had ruled England for more than two decades. He was married to Edith, but they had no children of their own. According to William, Edward had promised to make William his successor. But when Edward died in January 1066, the throne went to Edith’s brother Harold, the Earl of Wessex.